Who We Could Be
by chrissie0707
Summary: Missing scene 12X22 "Who We Are." He'll patch himself up, she knows, because he doesn't want her to think he can't. The British Men of Letters had conditioned Mary to kill without remorse, but she'd done something much worse. She'd conditioned her sons not to need a mother.


_Author Note: The feels from this ep killed me ded._

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 **Who We Could Be**

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A slight, hesitant touch at Mary's elbow startles her. She turns with a jerk, tearing her eyes from the body.

Dean raises his hand from her arm, hops back a step. His movements are weighted, delayed; there's a beat before one corner of his mouth lifts in a small, tired smile. "Just me." His voice is rough, raw with pain and exhaustion, and he shifts his weight with a wince.

She raises her eyebrows, glances around the wrecked room. "You left?"

"Yeah, uh…" Another pause as he limps forward, and Mary notices the sheet tucked under his arm.

Dean drops gingerly, excruciatingly slowly to his right knee, injured left leg scooting out to the side. He's silent and stone-faced as he lays the sheet over Ketch's body, and Mary glances away as blood begins to soak into the fabric. She looks back at the woman, surprised to see that Dean's already shifted her body to the floor and covered her.

Her sweet boy, protecting her. Shielding her from the violence and death that's just occurred here, some by her own hand.

Mary cocks her head, watching numbly as the red spot on the cotton sheet grows, as a second stain joins. She doesn't feel so much as a simple, generic pang of sadness over a loss of life. Not for either of them. She tries to remember if she even once felt anything beyond contempt for the son of a bitch, can't imagine she ever could have. Not this man, who did _this_ to her. Who tried to kill her boys.

Dean reaches up with his right hand and grips the edge of the table, knuckles white, and begins the slow process of hauling himself back to his feet. Once there he ducks his chin and swallows before turning to shuffle back toward Mary. Each forward motion of his hurt leg leaves him grimacing, his face pale where it isn't battered and bloody.

Suddenly Mary can't see, or think, beyond her son's pain. She sucks in a breath, and her heart tightens in her chest. She grips his sleeve and attempts to guide him toward a chair. "Dean, honey, sit down a minute."

"Mm," he protests, with a slight jerk of his head. He locks his right knee to stay upright, but doesn't pull away. "I sit down, I'm toast."

 _That's okay_ , Mary wants to say. _It's okay to stand down, to stop fighting and take care of yourself._ But she can't.

Dean doesn't know any different, because of the life he's had. The life she'd left him to.

Her eyes search his bloody face, knowing that Ketch had come here because of her, that Dean had been defenseless and open to attack because of her. Had already been injured, because of her.

She blinks, and sees past the blood, sees that exhausted, resigned look in Dean's eyes as Ketch had prepared to shoot. It wasn't nearly the first time her son had stared down the barrel, and he wasn't about to give the man the satisfaction of seeing fear.

In that moment, Mary had been both proud of, and so, so sorry for that look. A long, hard, _painful_ life had laid the road to that look, and there was no taking any of it back.

Forgiving doesn't mean forgetting.

She raises her fingers toward the open, weeping gash on Dean's cheek, but he grabs her arm, gently, and draws his head away with a wince.

He presses the back of his hand against his split lip, drops his eyes to the blood there. "I'll, uh, I'll be right back," he says hoarsely, but pauses long enough to offer her some attempt of a reassuring smile before turning to limp out of the room.

He'll patch himself up, she knows, because he doesn't want her to think he blames her, or that she has any sort of responsibility here.

And because he doesn't want her to think he _can't_.

The British Men of Letters had conditioned Mary to kill without remorse, but she'd done something much worse. She'd conditioned her sons not to need a mother.

Head pounding, heart twisted with guilt, she spins slowly, taking in the thrashed room. The broken tables, shattered glass and scattered books. Drops and smears of blood. Two bodies lying still and cold beneath sheets.

This is their _home_ , the first Dean's had since he was a boy, the only one Sammy's really known…and she let the wolf inside.

Mary's eyes are drawn to the chunked corner of concrete where her bullet had struck, and her breath catches.

She'd pulled the trigger, knowing full well what she was doing. Wanting to threaten. To _scare_.

She'd pointed her gun at Dean.

Six pounds of pressure. A single word from Ketch. That's all that had stood between Mary and shooting her son. From decorating these concrete walls with her little boy's blood.

But her guilt runs so much deeper than that.

 _You wanna play mother to my son?_

 _He's all yours._

She'd given him up – given both of them up – long before the needles started.

Mary had never been the mother, or the woman, her sons grew up thinking she was. And now that she's been given the chance, she hadn't even really tried.

 _Am I too different from the Mary you know?_

 _Or too much the same?_

Dean was right – they can start over. And this is as good a place as any, the easiest of her many messes that needs cleaning up. Mary rubs at her arm, then stoops and begins to gather the tossed books.

She doesn't get very far before the door reopens and Dean slowly limps back into the room, rattling a pill bottle.

"Found some expired prescription painkillers. So, uh, lucky me."

He only wants to make her feel better, to try not to worry her. If he's taken any of the pills, they haven't hit him yet. His movements are painfully slow, his limp worsened in the brawl with Ketch, and there's blood seeping through his pants leg, a large, scarlet stain. He's closed the deepest of the cuts with a pair of bandages, but hadn't taken the time to clean all the blood from his face. Hadn't wanted to leave her for that long.

He leans heavily against the pillar, the table, staring at the books in Mary's hands. "Mom, you don't have to do that. That's not your job."

 _No, it's my responsibility._ She lifts a shoulder, sets the books aside. "This…all of this…is because of me."

She guesses it's supposed to be another reassuring smile, the tight, pained, watery-eyed grimace that stretches across Dean's pale face. "It's gonna be okay."

He's just like his father. Always with the _it'll be okay_. Nurturers, both of them.

But Dean had never known that side of his father, because of her. His face is bloody and his eyes are glazed with pain, and it's not okay.

But Mary can _make_ it okay. She can do right by her boys this time, can protect them and keep them safe. The way she'd promised, a lifetime ago.

She can be a mother.


End file.
